


Axe is Overrated

by babywarg (morphaileffect)



Series: Ironstrange Bingo [14]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Comedy, M/M, Oblivious Stephen Strange, One Shot, Romance, Short One Shot, Tony Stark Does What He Wants
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-04
Updated: 2019-06-04
Packaged: 2020-04-07 20:19:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19092403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/morphaileffect/pseuds/babywarg
Summary: Stephen should have known better than to let himself get close enough to Tony to smell his hair.





	Axe is Overrated

**Author's Note:**

> It's been a night. this has been brought to you by the persistent I WILL WRITE SOMETHING SHORT AND FLUFFY IF IT KILLS ME feeling.
> 
> As well as this gorgeous pic: https://twitter.com/K4Sn5/status/1134044723994169344
> 
> (Do people still use “PWP” as a tag? Because I feel it fits this one perfectly.)
> 
> For the Ironstrange Bingo square "Scent."

Stephen should've known it was a matter of time.

Every time Tony - no. _Stark._ In this lifetime - got within half an arm’s length of him, four things assaulted his senses:

  1. How tight Tony’s pants always seemed to be (and how few other people could pull it off);
  2. How his voice commanded the room’s attention - when Stephen himself wasn’t speaking, of course;
  3. AXE BODY SPRAY; and
  4. The scent of his hair.



Stephen was okay with Axe, personally - maybe thought it was a bit overrated - but the _hair_...that was different.

That got to him.

Especially if Tony had just finished a battle. Or a workout. Or a few laps around the large circuit-sized personal racetrack in his backyard.

As a doctor, Stephen knew that pheromones were released mostly through the skin and the hair.

And he guessed Tony didn't much pay attention to the artificial scents in the hair products that he used, wasn’t aware of the effect that the natural smell of his hair had on Stephen.

Stephen wasn’t about to confess, and give Tony an avenue to Bella Swan all over him, mischievously flood him with hair pheromones every chance he got.

No. He was going to keep this one to himself.

But really - he should’ve known.

He was the only one who could look into alternate lifetimes. So the onus to be careful was on him.

In many lifetimes, he and Tony got together. Stephen kept all those lifetimes - and the few other lifetimes where they _didn’t_ get together - safely locked away in his head.

He'd had so much time to memorize Tony Stark's scent.

So much time to remember his knee-jerk reaction to it.

The reaction was, to put it plainly, to put his guard down. To make him feel at peace. Like everything was all right, because he was with the _one person_ \- the only person who could take the shitty parts of Stephen’s life in his hand, squeeze with minimal effort, and miraculously turn those turds into diamonds.

Safety was a feeling that was foreign to Stephen, since learning the mystic arts. So he should have known

\- that the day would come when he walked by Tony Stark, come within half an arm’s length of the man

\- and casually kiss the top of his head

\- simply because the smell of his hair put him at ease.

That should have been textbook.

And yet.

It happened anyway.

And Tony looked up at Stephen, eyes wide with questions.

And Stephen looked down at Tony, eyes wide with sheer naked panic.

How was he supposed to explain this?

_Okay, Tony, so...you know how I can travel between dimensions? Some of those dimensions are in really close proximity to ours. And in most of those dimensions, we’re lovers, so kissing each other’s hair is a normal thing between us. I know perfectly well it isn’t here. So I’m sorry. My bad._

Or...?

_WHAT?! Me, kiss your HAIR?? How DARE you, Stark. I stumbled and lost my footing. My lips accidentally fell on your head. That’s ALL._

As he was thinking, Tony swiveled his work chair toward him.

“What,” he muttered, “the _heck_ was that just now, Doc?”

The expression on Tony’s face was unreadable.

Stephen found all possible words fleeing his brain.

“I -- uh -- I -- “

His first instinct was to flee.

So he turned.

But Tony’s hand darted out and caught his sleeve.

And held on.

Tony pulled down on his sleeve. Hard. And given that his sleeve was made of hardy fabric, the rest of Stephen went down with it.

Before Stephen knew what was going on, he was face to face with Tony, their noses almost touching.

“What I mean to say is,” Tony said in a low, unexpectedly sultry voice, “after we’ve been dancing around each other for this long...that’s really all you got for me?”

 _Dancing around each other...?_ That was a concept Stephen had never seriously entertained.

Sometimes his memories of lifetimes blurred. In some lifetimes, yes, they “danced” around their mutual attraction. Unwilling or unready or simply unable to act upon their impulses.

But in this one...

...in this one, he saw the absolute certainty in Tony’s eyes, the infectious, indomitable _feeling_ that things were falling into place.

Had Stephen simply been oblivious all this time...?

“Let’s try that again,” Tony said, and leaned up for a kiss.

A proper one.

One that Stephen was in absolutely no state of mind to refuse.

Because he was drowning in the scent of Tony’s hair.

The intoxicating feeling of Tony’s lips on his. Tony’s fingers lightly resting on the back of his neck. Their tongues intertwining. Every fiber of his being saying _yes yesyesyes FINALLY._

And the stubborn undertones of Axe fucking body spray.


End file.
